1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is generally related to a control system for a marine vessel and, more particularly, to a method or system by which the control system can easily and quickly be initialized during the construction and assembly of the marine vessel or, alternatively, during a retrofit or recalibration procedure involving the marine vessel.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Marine vessels, particularly those with helms or control stations located away from the marine propulsion devices, require some way to allow the marine vessel operator to be located at a helm or control station and be able to control the operation of the marine vessel. This control includes the throttle control, steering control, and the monitoring of various operating parameters relating to the vessel. Some marine vessels provide mechanical steering and throttle controls which use cables connected between the marine propulsion system and the control station or helm. Other marine vessel control systems can utilize xe2x80x9cdrive-by-wirexe2x80x9d systems in which electronic signals are transmitted between the control station and the marine propulsion system to affect steering and/or engine speed control. Various types of control systems have been developed to allow an operator to control a land vehicle or marine vessel. Some control systems incorporate numerous components that are connected by individual conductive wires to a central control station. Similarly, gauges are individually connected by conductive wire to various sensors in a typical application. Alternatively, other systems use a common communication bus to which all devices in the system are connected. One type of communication bus is known as the controller area network (CAN) bus.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,038,500, which issued to Weiss on Mar. 14, 2000, describes a computer/bus message system for vehicle drive control systems. A drive system for utility vehicles, in particular for agricultural or industrial tractors, includes a generator driven by an internal combustion engine, a drive axle with wheels driven by associated electric motors which are powered by the generator, a steerable axle with wheels which are steerable together or individually by steering actuators, and manual operating control devices for vehicle operating functions such as steering. The drive system includes a process computer which includes parallel and independently operating function modules for controlling high priority vehicle functions, such as steering, as well as function modules for low priority vehicle functions, such as speed input. The process computer transmits target value signals for actuators, such as electric wheel drive motors and steering actuators, in the form of a combined message communicating over a system bus. Information is exchanged between the function modules internally within the processor.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,469,150, which issued to Site on Nov. 21, 1995, describes a sensor actuator bus system. A four-wire bus is provided with a two-wire signal bus and a plurality of sensors and actuators attached to both two-wire busses. A modification is provided to the standard controller area network (CAN) protocol developed and provided by Robert Bosch GmbH, in which the standard CAN header, of a data packet is modified to incorporate a shortened device identifier priority. By shortening the identifier field of the CAN header three bits are made available for use as a short form protocol data unit which can be used to contain binary information representing both the change of status of a identified device and the current status of the device.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,903,565, which issued to Neuhaus et al on May 11, 1999, describes a serial bus system using bitwise arbitration for independently communicating with and controlling individual bus systems. A star coupler for serial bus systems operates in compliance with the carrier sense multiple access (CSMA) method. The star coupler connects a plurality of individual bus systems to corresponding T-drivers and associated logic circuits, so that arbitration is performed within the total bus system in which all individual bus systems are included. Feedback suppression is used to assure unidirectional data flow, while error detection is combined with switching logic to disable faulty individual bus systems without affecting the other connected individual bus systems.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,860,020, which issued to Van Venrooy et al on Jan. 12, 1999, describes an operating system for a real-time hybrid environment. A distributed data processing system in an surface vehicle comprises sensors, user I/O, data processing and mass storage of geographical data. By means of a restricted library of system calls or primitives that can only be processed as unitary entities after deterministic transport control while keeping the transfer stateless, the distributed real-time operating system allows coexistent running of a plurality of processes that share localized processing power and/or a device, a sensor, I/O and/or file date.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,444,626, which issued to Schenk on Aug. 22, 1995, describes a control system for calculating parameter control values in repetitive control processes. It is known for a central electronic control unit in a motor vehicle to exchange data through a serial data bus with other control units, such as those for fuel injection, ignition timing, and braking. Prior art systems transmitted these data automatically, regardless of whether all these parameters were relevant to the actual operating state of the vehicle, thereby resulting in heavy loading of the serial bus. The present invention determines which parameters are irrelevant to the current operating state and suppresses transmission, or even calculation, of these irrelevant parameters.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,109,986, which issued to Gaynor et al on Aug. 29, 2000, discloses an idle speed control system for a marine propulsion system. The idle speed control system for a marine propulsion system controls the amount of fuel injected into the combustion chamber of an engine cylinder as a function of the error between a selected target speed and an actual speed. Speed can be engine speed measured in revolutions per minute or, alternatively, it can be a boat speed measured in nautical miles per hour or kilometers per hour. By comparing target speed to actual speed, the control system selects an appropriate pulse width length for the injection of fuel into the combustion chamber and regulates the speed by increasing or decreasing the pulse width.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,273,771, which issued to Buckley et al on Aug. 14, 2001, discloses a control system for a marine vessel which incorporates a marine propulsion system that can be attached to a marine vessel and connected in signal communication with a serial communication bus and a controller. A plurality of input devices and output devices are also connected in signal communication with the communication bus and a bus access manager, such as a CAN Kingdom network, is connected in signal communication with the controller to regulate the incorporation of additional devices to the plurality of devices in signal communication with the bus whereby the controller is connected in signal communication with each of the plurality of devices on the communication bus. The input and output devices can each transmit messages to the serial communication bus for receipt by other devices.
In a marine vessel control system, such as that described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,273,771, many configurations of marine propulsion systems can be provided. The marine vessel builder or outfitter has a wide choice of marine propulsion devices, helm control systems, and peripheral devices from which to choose in constructing the control and propulsion system for the marine vessel. When all of the devices on a marine vessel are connected to a serial communication bus, it is necessary for the outfitter or boat builder to make sure that all of the devices on the marine vessel are compatible with each other and, furthermore, that the various devices are completely aware of their particular function on the marine vessel and the function of other components with which they must operate.
The patents described above are hereby explicitly incorporated by reference in the description of the present invention.
It would therefore be significantly beneficial if an automatic or partially automatic procedure could be developed in which a boat builder or marine vessel outfitter could easily cause all of the components connected to a serial is communication bus of a marine vessel to be properly identified to all of the other components and devices with which it must operate cooperatively.
A method for initializing a marine vessel control system, in accordance with the preferred embodiment of the present invention, comprises the steps of determining the number of individual marine propulsion devices (e.g. outboard motors, stem drive devices, inboard systems, jet drive systems) associated with the marine vessel and identifying each of the individual marine propulsion devices when it is determined that more than one of the individual marine propulsion devices are associated with the marine vessel. The method of the present invention, in a preferred embodiment, further comprises the steps of determining the number of control stations, or helms, associated with the marine vessel and identifying each of the control stations when it is determined that more than one of the control stations are associated with the marine vessel. The determining step relating to the number of individual marine propulsion devices, in a particularly preferred embodiment, comprises the step of interrogating a signal on a communication bus to determine if more than one of the individual marine propulsion devices is transmitting a signal on the communication bus. This step is performed by a microprocessor, connected in signal communication with the communication bus, which knows the expected timing intervals during which each individual marine propulsion device provides a signal on the communication bus. If the signal frequency for data packets on the communication bus exceeds an expected magnitude, this is indicative that more than one marine propulsion device is connected to the system.
The method of the present invention further comprises the step of prompting a human being to identify the physical location of each of the individual marine propulsion devices on the marine vessel when it is determined that more than one individual marine propulsion device is associated with the marine vessel.
A preferred embodiment of the present invention further comprises the step of determining the number of individual gauges associated with the marine vessel and identifying each of the individual gauges in terms of its relationship with an associated one of the individual marine propulsion devices on the marine vessel when more than one of the individual gauges is associated with a marine vessel. The method of the present invention can further comprise the step of prompting an operator to identify each of the individual gauges in terms of its association with an associated one of the individual marine propulsion devices on the marine vessel and, in addition, in terms of its association with one of the control stations or helms.
In a particularly preferred embodiment of the present invention, the marine vessel control system comprises a controller area network (CAN) system. The method of the present invention can further comprise the step of determining the operational type of each of the individual marine propulsion devices associated with the marine vessel, wherein the operational type of each of the individual marine propulsion devices associated with the marine vessel is obtained from a data packet comprising of a plurality of bytes, or pages, of information. The data packet is transmitted on a controller area network communication bus by each of the individual marine propulsion devices associated with the marine vessel.
The present invention further comprises the step of selecting a default screen display for each of the control stations of the marine vessel as a function of the operational type of each of the individual marine propulsion devices.